


Aftermath

by orphan_account



Category: Firefly, Serenity (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-02-07
Updated: 2009-02-07
Packaged: 2017-10-02 05:24:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,671
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3051
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wash is captured by the Alliance. Mal has to get him back.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Aftermath

1.

Wash, what’s your status?—over.

“Base, that would be—two clicks from target. We’re about coming up on visual, over.”

Wash piloted the skiff through the dense cloud cover, so thick in the mountains this time of year it rendered the other fifty-nine skiffs in his squadron invisible.

He double checked the weapons systems as they lowered their altitude. When they closed in on the target Wash did a double take.

There was no mistaking it: it was a settlement. And unarmed, too, from the looks of it; not even any anti-aircraft. They were supposed to be bombing a munitions factory. Wash held his fire and radioed an update back to base.  

Stand by for orders— over.

Why don’t they seem all that surprised? Wash made another pass around the perimeter and then it came through on the comm:

The mission is a go—repeat—the mission is a go.

Wash brought the skiff around and radioed the rest of the squadron. No gorramn way he was dropping bombs on an unarmed civilian settlement. When he got back, he was going to give the CO a piece of his mind.  

Back at the base, Wash brought the skiff gently to earth. Wash couldn’t say he was entirely surprised to find that no one else had followed suit. The pilots in his squadron were cherry-picked as the best and the brightest—and most of them were true believers in the Alliance cause.

He was surprised, however, to see them. Across the rain-slick runway.

Military Police.   

He’d had his share of run-ins with the commanding officers. Military life—all the saluting and ‘yes sir’ing—never come natural to him, despite his background. Even spent a few nights in the brig because he couldn’t resist making a crack or two at a superior officer’s expense.   

But this was different; he could tell. When he climbed out of the cockpit, it didn’t take more than a glance at the hard expressions that matched the soldiers’ starched-stiff blue uniforms to tell they meant business. He took a deep breath to calm his nerves. He wouldn’t change what he did though. He knew that for sure.

Later, he was also less than surprised to find out that the bombing of civilian settlements was no accident. On paper, it was all about winning hearts and minds, but in practice, it was turning into much more of a scorched earth policy. Break the morale of Independents, the thinking went, destroy what they’re fighting for, and the rest will take care of itself.    

His father did surprise him though, with how easy he made it look to turn his back on his only son.

They saw one another for the last time the morning of the military tribunal. His father, true to form, showed up in full dress uniform. Man as important as he is, Wash thought, four star general in the Air Command and all, probably has some official engagement to attend after this that he can’t be late for. He went to look in his father’s eyes and they weren’t looking at him so much as through him. As distant as they’d always been, it still hurt more than he expected.

With his sister though, it was different. They were always close. The last time he saw her, he was already convicted of desertion and had started to serve out his sentence.    
   
Wash—you  understand. I’m up for captain soon. They look at stuff like this— the people you spend time with. Every time I come through those doors, it goes on my permanent record. Those settlements are illegal, Wash, as in against the law, is that what you’re in favor of?

Watching her leave, returning the guard’s smart salute as she exits the visitors’ room, he knew a chapter of his life had come to a close.

2.

“Wèi le ài de tiān a!”

Wash jumped in surprise, nearly hitting his head on the instrument panel he’d crawled half-way under.

“Wā cào, Mal, don’t sneak up on me like that.”

At least, he hoped it was Mal, considering the hand that made him jump in surprise was now working its way up his thigh determinedly, stopping every so often to knead a muscle here and there through the thin material of his jumpsuit.

“Mal—”

And now that palm was cupping his rapidly growing cock.

“Mal . . .”

The second time Wash said Mal’s name it was more of a groan than a protest. When he heard his fly being unzipped, he went silent altogether.  

Familiar, gun-calloused fingers worked open his fly and he felt cool air on his exposed skin. A warm tongue snaked up the underside of his shaft in soft, slow strokes, and then he was engulfed in wet heat, moaning as he felt his balls being cupped and lips forming a tight seal, sliding up and down him in a gentle rhythm.  
   
Before long he was thrusting into that mouth that knew exactly how to undo him. He came calling Mal’s name.

He’s barely had a few recovery breaths before a voice crackled over the comm.

“Wash? I still ain’t seein’ nothin’. Lemme try somethin’ else.”

“Kaylee!” Wash jumped again and this time he really did hit his head on the instrument panel. “Dì yù.” Pulling himself out, he tried to shake off his post-orgasmic haze.

Mal, still wiping his mouth languorously, gave him a mischievous grin as he reached for the comm.

“Yī shí kè, Kaylee, just a minute—”

“Well whatcha been doin’? ‘m standin’ here. Don’t get this system back online ‘fore we hafta break atmo, Cap’n’ll be fit t’be tied.”

Wash grinned at the captain. “Yup. Mean old piánzhì de jiū chá yuán. Give ‘er a sec to warm up then tell me what you see.”

Wash slid back under the instrument panel and got to work. When he re-emerged Mal was still looking pleased with himself.  
   
“Got somethin’. Last time we were planet side.”

“Oh?” Wash quirked a blonde eyebrow.

“Been savin’ it for somethin’ special. Figured this shore leave we might have a bit of time to our own selves . ..” Mal reached into his pocket. He had that boyish grin on his face that meant he was about to get into mischief and he couldn’t be more pleased. Wash loved that grin.

Mal dangled a pair of handcuffs. “Wanna play?”

Wash’s face went ashen. He said nothing.

“Uh—Wash?”

“Mal, I’ve got work to do—”

“Everything alright?”

“—so if you could just leave me the hell alone, maybe I could get to it.”

Mal looked stunned. Stunned and confused. “Think we mighta had a bit of a misunderstand—”

 “Work. To do. Is there something about that concept that’s exceptionally difficult to understand?”

Mal’d never seen Wash like this. He was smart enough to know he should take his leave.

  
3.

“Wanna play?”

“I think he passed out, after the guys from the D block came over t’have their fun, but you can dunk ‘is head in the toilet or somethin’—that’ll wake ‘im up right quick. Course, he don’t hafta t’be awake neither.”

The beaten, bloodied prisoner on the floor wasn’t unconscious; he heard every word the guards said.

“Can’t put my finger on why this one’s so much more fun than the rest.”

Wash heard a low chuckle. “’Cause he fights it so much harder than all others.”

Wash heard heavy footsteps approaching. He was too exhausted to flinch.

4.

“Looks like all that is a go, Kaylee,” said Wash into the comm.. “Four down, two to go. With any luck, we’ll get the rest of this maintenance done an’ hail the others, tell ‘em we’re ready to go early if they are.”

“You gettin’ lonesome, Wash, with jus’ me an’ River fer company?”

“Just tired of losing at Tallcard is all. River claims she turns off that reader-thing, but I don’t know—”

“Yeah, right,” the voice came back good-naturedly, “You’re ‘bout as eager for Mal t’get back as I am for Simon. S’ no fun, goin’ back t’the battery-operated after—”

“Kaylee!” Wash said, mock-scandalized.

They worked awhile longer, going through the nav system layer by layer. The next time he heard a voice through the comm, it was anything but joking.

“Wash! S’ River! Get down here.”

Kaylee didn’t have to explain.

“Lăo tiān bù, I’ll be right there.”

Wash cursed to himself as he dashed to the engine room. Since Miranda, River had been far more lucid, but even with all the good work her brother’s done for her, she still had these spells from time to time. When the Alliance plays, they play for keeps.

When Wash stepped over the hatch, she was in the corner, beating her small fists against the bulkhead and crying hysterically. Kaylee was trying cautiously to approach her.

“Hey, River,” he said soothingly “it’s me, Wash.”

The two of them tried to talk her down for awhile, trying to decide whether to get Simon’s medkit, but eventually she just exhausted herself. She leaned against the bulkhead, sliding down until her head rested in her hands and she rocked herself, tears still streaming, humming a nursery rhyme under her breath.

When Wash heard what she’s humming, he felt the hairs on his neck stand on end.

5.

“It’s pure,” Simon acknowledged, holding the test tube up to the light as he finished the last test. “It’s what we came for.”

Mal tossed a pouch of coin over. “Always appreciate doin’ business with honest folk.”

“Likewise,” the ringleader said guardedly, handing the money over to his associate to count. When he nodded approvingly, the men took their leave without further comment.

“Best we start loadin’ this up.”

“Well whatta ya know, that was a milk run,” Jayne said as the three of them started to load crates into the shuttle.

“Don’t jinx it, Jayne,” Mal said, trying to keep his voice sounding good-natured. The crew was a mite unaccustomed to jobs that didn’t end in shooting one way or another. One going this uncharacteristically smooth was making him feel a bit superstitious, though he was loathed to admit it.

The captain strained to slide a particularly cumbersome crate into place, wiping the sweat from his forehead on a rolled-up sleeve.

“Best we get goin’,” he said to no one in particular, looking out onto the dusk-pink horizon. “Somethin’ bout this place just don’t sit right with me.”  

6.

“Kaylee—go get Simon’s medkit.” Wash took a deep breath in a vain effort to steady his nerves. A coincidence, he told himself, nothing to do with her being a reader. “We’ve gotta get that shot he told us to give her.” He hoped that came out sounding less panicked than he felt.

“Wait—Wash? You hear sumthin’?”

“No. What? Kaylee, just get”

“Ssshhh! There it ‘s again.”

Kaylee’s body was rigid with fright. Wash tried to listen over River’s agitated murmuring. Truthfully, it was hard to hear anything over his heart pounding in his ears.

They both heard it the next time.

“Sounds like something on the hull—”

“Sshhh,” Wash whispered. “I know.”

“But how--”

“’Cause we took the proximity beacon off-line for two hours that’s how—”  

“There it is again—”

“Ye su. Kaylee, listen to me. Take River—you know where to go.”

“But what about—”

“I’ve gotta seal the hatch.”

Kaylee’s hands were shaking. Wash took River by the arm, pulling her up.

“Kaylee. Take her. Go.”

As the two of them hurry off, Wash ran toward the bridge, praying there was still time to seal off the central hatch and hail Mal that they had trouble.  

Sprinting around the corner to the bridge he nearly ran headlong into the business end of an automatic weapon. Six of them, in fact.   

“Freeze! Hands up!”

Swallowing a curse, Wash slowly raised his hands as an Alliance officer leisurely stepped down from the bridge behind his men.

“Washburne.”

Wash didn’t answer. He figured his look of disgust probably said it all.

“Things seem awful quiet around here. The captain is off engaged in some sort of petty crime, I presume?”

Wash said nothing.

“It’s no matter. That’s not what we’re here about,” the officer continued, hands clasped behind his back, weaving his way through his soldiers’ cocked firearms to circle him slowly.

Like a shark, Wash thought. Or a vulture.

“Where is River Tam?”

“The River Tam? I don’t know—I was never much for geograph—”  

The officer was half-way behind him, so the gloved fist that connected with his cheek seemed to come out of nowhere. Wash reeled as the pain shot across his face, but did his best to steady himself, shaking his head to get his bearings.

“Oh! Right. Tam. It’s in the west Yuasa mount—”

The next punch sent him stumbling against the bulkhead.

The officer smirked down at him like a cruel schoolteacher who enjoyed it when his students gave a wrong answer.

“Is River Tam with you or not?”

Wash tasted blood in his mouth, spilling out over his lip.

“I know Reynolds wouldn’t take her with him. So soon after all the publicity, she’d still be recognizable. He’d be giving this a chance to blow over.”

The officer crouched down next to Wash. “So is she on this ship, or did Reynolds drop her off someplace?”

“She’s not here,” Wash breathed hoarsely. It hurt to move his mouth too much.

“So when we take you with us, you won’t object if we destroy your bridge and cut your life support systems before we leave?”

“Maybe a coupla rats might object—”

That earned him a vicious kick in the kidney.

“Sir,” a soldier coming in interrupted, “the body heat sensors aren’t picking anything else up.”

“Ah, and here we were having so much fun finding out the old-fashioned way. Get him onto the ship.”

Two of the soldiers stepped forward, hauling Wash up by his arms and hand-cuffing him with military precision. Even through the pain and dizziness, the feel of cold metal around his wrists sent panic shooting up his spine. The soldier’s voice sounded like it was coming from a distance:

“Hoban Washburne, you are bound by law . . .”

The officer motioned to the bridge. “Do it.”

One of the soldiers produced a hood. Everything went black.

  
7.

“Are they gone?” Kaylee said in a choked whisper.

Kaylee and River huddled together in the darkness, safe in their specially-fitted hiding place.

“Not gone. Still lifting all the lids on the baskets, looking for the snake.” River had that eerie calm about her that she always does in times of real danger. Kaylee tried to hold back the tears; but it was no use, they still fall hot and fast down her cheeks.

8.

“Wā cào.”

“Cap’n, wha’sa matter?”

“Nothin’ Jayne, jus’—shénshèng de gāowán.”

“What?”

“Is—something wrong?” Simon poked his head into the shuttle’s cockpit.

“Nothin’, jus’—the dockin’ mechanism not workin’ for gŏu shǐ. Hailed Wash on the comm an’ he ain’t pickin’ up.”

“Weren’t Kaylee and Wash supposed to be doing maintenance while we were gone? Maybe they still have some of the systems offline.”

“Shoulda been long done by now,” the captain said, aggravated. “Jus’ gotta use the manual override, guess.”

9.

Strange as it seemed, it was the quiet that woke Wash up. The quiet coupled with the agonizing throb on the back of his head, more like. Instinctively, he went to touch, pulling his hand away when he felt the sharp sting and the congealed blood.

It was the silence, he was convinced, that was going to kill him. After so many years in the black, sleeping to the hum of the engine had become second nature. His ship used to feel like a second skin—a second skin he’d been stripped of. Now, when he went to sleep on the cold floor of a small, windowless cell, he could still feel the motion as he drifted off, when the exhaustion overcame the throb of new and old wounds, and the hunger that cut through him like a knife.

10.  
   
Mal could hear the blare even before the shuttle door slid open. That jarring siren coupled with the artificial, feminine voice:

Life support failure. Check oxygen levels at once. Jeŏ shúng yŏng jùr gŏ-jáng. Jièn-chá yŏng-chì gŏng yìn. Life support failure. Check oxygen levels at once . . .

Jayne and Simon followed him as he rushed out, looking for the rest of the crew. Jayne’s weapon was already drawn.

“Wash! Kaylee!”

When the captain dashed up the stairs onto the bridge, he found only River and Kaylee, foreheads wet with sweat, hard at work over the ruined console. Kaylee’s eyes were red from crying.

“Kaylee! You alright? What the gorramn hell?” He rushed to take her in his arms.

“Mèi mèi, tell me you’re okay.” He tried to ignore the knowing expression on River’s face. It said she knew something that he wasn’t going to want to know. “Where’s Wash lil’ Kaylee? He in the engine room?”

With that, Kaylee began to cry again.

12.

At least the cuffs are off, Wash thought, though he figured what’s the use, with so many fingers broken?

We’ll set them for you, the interrogator had said. Fix them up like it never happened. Tell us what we need to know, and we’ll see to everything: a bath, a hot meal, a hospital bed. That’s right, a bed—

Wash wondered how long he’d been there. There weren’t any clocks or windows anywhere he’d been; nothing to connect him to the world outside or another human being. He’d seen no one but his interrogators and the guards that took him back and forth, and they hardly qualified.

He wondered how long he was going last, how long he could go before they broke him and he ending up telling them everything he knew and a few things he didn’t.

13.

Kaylee had fixed enough of the instrument panel that Serenity got the hail from Inara’s shuttle.

“Nara,” Mal answered, “ain’t you supposed t’be at the trainin’ house ‘nother couple days?”

“Mal,” her voice crackled over the comm, “how could I stay? I came back as soon as I could, after I saw what happened with . . . everything . . .”

That unnerved Mal more than a bit, and not just because the Companion was at a rare loss for words. “Saw what ‘Nara? We ran into a mess a trouble the last few days that’s for sure, but I don’t see how you coulda known—”

“Nán yi zhì xìn de. You haven’t seen have you, Mal?”

* * *

The CorVue in Inara’s shuttle was the only one functioning since the Alliance soldiers inflicted as much damage on the ship as they could without actually destroying it. The signal was weak this far out in the black, the image bluish, wavy, but the audio came through clear:

—as expected, the verdict has come down ‘guilty’ in one of the year’s most-watched terrorism cases.  Since this is a second offense, Hoban Washburne has been sentenced to life imprisonment. He was convicted of desertion as a pilot during the Unification War, but served just three years due to the amnesty granted after the Armistice. Washburne is the son of Retired General Alexander Washburne, decorated veteran of the Kìnjerŏ War, the Coogan Offensive, and Unification War. His sister is also a decorated war veteran—

14.

Mal looked out over the table. His eyes didn't meet any of the eyes looking back at him, each with expressions of pained concern. Mal was usually the one to take charge, to put his boot on the table and speechify; but now, there was just silence. They knew this was different—this was Wash.

“But how could they a’known? I don’t get—”

“Know how they knew, lil’ Kaylee.”

“What d’ya mean?”

Mal stared into space, his arms crossed.

“”bout a month ago, on Takeshi Moon.”

“When we was on shore leave?” Jayne interjected, but Mal doesn’t answered.

Mal’s mind flashed back to a bar in an Alliance-friendly city. They’d just found a job, an unusually profitable one at that, and Mal had felt flush with confidence. Relaxed. Off his game, he thought, more to the point. Even though they’d already made the deal, Mal had decided they could stay an extra day so the crew could have a well-deserved break.

Someone was watching. Even on the outer edges of the Core, someone is always watching.

He and Wash found themselves in a dark, out-of-the-way place, drinking and talking. There didn’t seem to be a reason for Mal not to rest his hand on Wash’s knee. No reason for Wash not to lean in when he told a joke, flirting a bit the way he always did, for Mal not to lean in even closer, inviting a kiss. No reason for Mal not to nod to the barkeep to toss him a key and lead Wash, hand in the small of the back, toward the upstairs rooms for rent.

Except there were security cameras covering every square inch of every Alliance-controlled moon. They knew alright. Mal cursed himself about a thousand times.

The assembled faces around the table knew better than to press Mal when he didn’t elaborate.  

“What’d we do now?” Kaylee asked.

“Start searching.” River’s voice was calm, deliberate. Filled with more confidence than the rest of them had.

15.

Wash knew why cells like these have nothing in them but a small toilet.

There isn’t much limit to human ingenuity when faced with this kind of misery. He did it all the time when the guards escorted him to the latest round of “interrogation”: not just mentally measuring the distance between his handcuffed hands and the guards weapons, which he’d done a thousand times, but everything—the windows high above them, facing into darkened rooms, looked like glass that could be shattered into shards sharp enough to slice open a neck. The leather of the guards’ sashes, even the cloth of their uniforms, a person could use to hang themselves. Everything looked like an object of death, because death offered the only escape.  
     
They called it interrogation, but the word was little more than window dressing to cover up the truth. A place like this? It was like the inmates have taken over the asylum—people with the worst sort of impulses, the worst sort of appetites—given free reign to do as they like until their blood lust found more and more twisted outlets.

  
16.

Three months, and still no luck. Every minute that wasn’t not spent on a job they needed to put food on the table, they spent looking up contacts, following up rumors, looking everywhere they can think of for clues. But everything they tried, it seemed, was a dead end.

“How come they didn’t wait fer Mal an’ me t’get back? Thas’ what I don’t git. Few more hours an’ they coulda had the lotta us. Ain’t it Mal they wan’ anyhow? He’s the one shoved that Miranda thing up their pigu.”

Jayne, Inara, and Kaylee were gathered around the table, looking over some stolen prison intake records.

“It is Mal they want, Jayne” Inara said. “But all the publicity made him untouchable. That disc was a shot heard around the ‘verse. It put a serious dent in the credibility of the Alliance and their so-called improvement programs.”

This business had hit Inara especially hard. Mal, Jayne, and Kaylee grew up on the Rim, raised to believe that the Alliance had nothing but the needs of the elite in mind. But for Inara, who’d been raised as part of that world, it was hard to face the reality that the pristine exterior masked a wealth of injustices.

“The Alliance is in damage control mode. But more than that, I’d guess that certain men in this—regime—want revenge. They can’t take Mal without losing more credibility, but with Wash¬—” she tried to hide a wince. ¬“They can still get their revenge on Mal. And since he was already convicted of crimes against the state, it doesn’t look as political for them to take him.”

17.

“Do you remember me, Hoban?”

Wash blinked, trying to adjust his eyes to the harsh light of the interrogation room, to get his one good eye to focus. The other had been swelled shut for so long he could hardly remember seeing out of it.

Wash looked at the officer and he saw the years had changed him: there was more gray around his temples, deeper lines around his eyes. Some added weight had softened his jawline, added a bit more slope to his shoulders.

But Wash would have recognized that face anywhere.  

“I take it you do,” the answer came with the cold half-smile. “Let’s see what we have.”  

The officer rose slowly and crossed to the other side of the table. Leaning on the table, he unbuttoned the top buttons of Wash’s tattered shirt and pushed the fabric aside. Wash didn’t make any move to resist. Even if his hands weren’t cuffed behind his back, there wouldn’t be any use. Even so, he winced as the metal buttons dragged over fresh wounds.

The officer looked over the bloom of dark purple bruises across Wash’s shoulders and the mess of cuts dispassionately.

“We both know this is child’s play compared to what I’m capable of.” The officer said in an easy, matter-of-fact voice. His tone didn’t have a hint of threat; he’d been doing this long enough to know it didn’t have to. Wash had all the signs, plain as day: the darting gaze, the jaw, clenching and unclenching despite his desperate efforts to stay in control. Wash was terrified, and he had every reason to be.

They tell me that these days you’re some Browncoat’s yănsè lāng.” The officer leaned in closer, his arms folded across his chest. “Is that true—are you some Browncoat’s whore?”

Wash said nothing. The officer was so close he could see the lines in his face, a shaving cut, the individual hairs on his temple. “Do you really take it up the ass from some Rim world yī gè biăozi de yúwàng érzi?”

Wash’s blue eyes met his cold, grey ones.

“You like getting down on your knees, you yóu zhī hóuzi, and sucking Browncoat cock?” The officer’s disgust dripped off every word.

“You have no idea.”

Wash barely had time to register the gloved fist meeting his face before everything went black again.

18.

Mal was alone in his bunk, same as he was most nights. Sheaves of paper were laid out across his desk—prisoner transfer records for the Gamma Nine quadrant, purchased through an old contact for a pretty penny. Even if the Alliance was using Wash’s real name, which was doubtful for a prisoner convicted of terrorism, finding him would be like finding a needle in a haystack.

Jayne’s words echoed in his head: You gotta forget that boy, Mal. It’s a damn shame, ‘lliance taken ‘em like they did. But there’s about as many penal moons inna Core as specks a’ dirt onna pig’s ass. Even if ya knew which one had ‘em, ya wouldn’t be able t’track ‘im down with a hound dog an’ a Ouija board, many prisoners as they got.

He’d hit Jayne square in the jaw for saying it. You want off this boat, Jayne? Jus’ say the word an’ I’ll leave you at the nex’ port. No one’s on my  boat ‘cause they hafta be—

Mal knew he hit Jayne more because he was afraid he was right than he angry with him for being wrong.

But still, here he was bent over a stack of papers. He couldn’t just sit around doing nothing. If he did, he thought he might die from it. So hour after hour he pored over the sheets, column after column, each one reducing a living, breathing person’s fate to a set of government acronyms.

The others were hard at work in the galley, but like most nights, he couldn’t bring himself to join them. He avoided them as much as possible these days. A captain needed to be strong for his crew if he was going to keep them flying. He couldn’t let them see his eyes glazed over from lack of sleep, his face creased from worry.

19.

“Sir?”

The guard looked over the table to the officer. The prisoner was unconscious; his cue to either return him to his cell or give him an injection that will jolt him back to consciousness so they can start another round.

The officer considered. “Leave him to the guards,” he said impassively. “Let them have their fun for awhile and then we’ll see if he’s ready to talk.”

  
20.

Mal was asleep. He knew he was asleep, because Wash was there.

Wash was saying something, but he couldn’t make out what it was. It didn’t matter; it was something happy, some nonsense like Wash talked sometimes. They were outside in the sun and the light shone off his reddish-blonde hair. They were kissing—warm lips on warm lips and Wash’s tongue was pressing against his and there were hands, wrapping around him, pulling him in greedily, running light touches up and down his backbone.

It took him by surprise when he felt something wet spreading across his chest and down his thighs.

He pulled away from the kiss and looked down, seeing it. It was spreading, warm and fast. Not just on his legs now, but everywhere.

Blood.

He couldn’t see Wash anymore; he was blurry, even though he was just a foot away. He could hear Wash’s heart though. It was pounding, louder and louder. The more he listened to it, the more metallic it sounded.

Bang . . . bang . . . bang—  
   
“Mal!”

The voice finally broke through his sleep.

“Mal, open up!”

Mal roused himself, the piece of paper he fell asleep on sticking to his face a bit as he sat up.

“Mal!”

“M’ comin’!”

Mal opened the hatch to find Inara on the other side. “Nara? What’dya doin’ here this tima night? Tryin’ wake the whole gorramn ship—”

“Mal, you’re—” she paused, looking concerned—“still fully dressed.”

“So’re you¬—”

“I just got back from seeing a client. Listen—”

“N’ you’re knockin’ on my door at—what time’s it anyhow?”

“Past three. “Mal—bì zuĭ. Listen to me. I had to get you up.”

Mal was fully awake by then. He’s never seen her like this: Inara hadn’t so much as cleaned the smeared make-up off her face and she was so amped up he thought she must’ve just drank about a gallon of coffee.

“It was my client, Mal. He’s seen Wash. And he let something slip.”

21.

The speech he gave was a familiar one, as familiar as the faces around the table who watched him intently; too polite to point out that they’ve heard all of this, more or less, before.

I’m askin’ more o’ you than I have before. This is strictly volunteer . . .

Once again, everyone agreed that—odds be damned—they were in. Even Jayne. Just like before, the deck was stacked against them even more than they could have realized going in. At least this time, after all the close calls and bloodshed, they came back with as many as they set out with. One more, in fact.

22.

“Didn’t think I’d see any of this again.”

Wash’s voice was barely audible, almost drowned out by the beeping machine Simon had him hooked up to. Mal wasn’t sure if Wash looked better or worse now that he was out of that place and cleaned up. He’d been horrified by what he’d found when he and Jayne broke into Wash’s cell; but at least the grime had hidden the worst of it.

“Didn’t think you’d get away from us that easy, did you?” Mal tried hard to smile.

The words come out flat and stale.

Wash didn’t smile either. Mal wasn’t sure that was because he didn’t want to or because his lip looked to be split pretty painfully.

“How long have you been sitting here?” Wash said.

The entire night. Every minute since we got back, even though Simon tried repeatedly to kick me out.

“Lil’ ‘while.”

Mal knew he’d never been good at expressing himself when it came to anything but being a sergeant or captain. Giving speeches that get people killed, he thought, guilt twisting in his guts like a knife.

“How’d you do it?” Wash’s voice sounded oddly hollow, distant.

“Nara’s connections. Jayne’s muscle and sure shot. Simon’s doctorin’—he passed himself off as a med inspector—you shoulda seen it. River’s ability to hack inta the prison mainframe—plus her—various other abilities.”

Wash didn’t seem to be listening, so he stopped talking.

“Impossible,” Wash said to no one in particular, “escape from an Alliance prison.”

Mal wasn’t sure what to say to that. “Done the impossible before, Wash.”

“And knowing the way things go around here, we’re probably going to end up doing it again.”

There was white-hot anger in Wash’s voice, laced with so much bitterness that Mal wasn’t even sure he heard right. Now he was really at a loss. Wash didn’t give him any clues as to how to proceed either.

Neither of them said anything for a long time. Wash stared up at the ceiling with a look that Mal couldn’t quite decipher until he felt so uncomfortable that he left.

23\. Six Weeks Later

“Shénshèng de gāowán, again?”

Kaylee had come down to the cargo bay where he and Jayne were shifting cargo. She had that stressed, frightened look on her face that was all too familiar these days.  

Jayne was on Mal’s heels all the way down to the infirmary. The sound of a tray clattering to the floor and shouting match already in progress met them before they made it all the way there.

“Wash, you have to let me—I’m telling you, without these meds, your body can’t fight the infection—”

“And I’m telling you, those things make me jumpy—”

“You’re jumpy ‘cause ya don’t sleep fer days on end,” Jayne interjected, leaning against the counter and crossing his arms.

“Wash, we ain’t goin’ through this again,” Mal said, trying to temper his captain-voice. “Simon’s tryin’ help you--”

“I can’t fly when I take those things--”

“Also,” Jayne continued, “reckon’ you could eat somethin’ once inna while--”

“Liú kŏushuĭ de biăozi hé hóuzi de bèn érzi,” the pilot spat back.

“Wash!” Mal made no effort to sound like anything except the captain that time. “Need my pilot healthy, dŏng má? You do what Simon—”

“Don’t you tell me—”

Mal nodded to Jayne and the two of them moved in, taking Wash by the arms and holding him to the medical bed. Wash’s struggled as hard as he could, his yelling degenerating into an incoherent stream of curses as Simon gave him the injection.

Mal hated this little routine more than almost anything.

  
24.

“Belongs inna bughouse, he does.”

“Jayne!” Kaylee admonished, looking up from her protein stew. “’S not his fault.”

Everyone else at the dinner table looked down at their food uncomfortably. Except Mal, of course, but he said nothing.

“Besides, Jayne, he ain’t got no choice but t’be on this ship. We take ‘em t’some hospital, they’ll do a retinal scan, see who he is, an’ send ‘em right back.”

“Never said it was ‘is fault, jus’ sayin’ the boy ain’t right no more. An’ havin’ a pilot that’s loony tunes don’t sit right with me—no ‘ffense,” he added, looking in River’s direction.

“Um . . .none taken.”

“What if he loses it an’ runs us inta some rock or sumthin’?”

“Jayne, I wouldn’t let Wash fly if I didn’t think it was safe.”

“It does seem,” Inara said, looking worriedly between the two of them, “that Wash is still a very good pilot. The bridge is—actually kind of the only place he seems at home these days—”

“You sure, Mal,” Jayne interrupted, ignoring the Companion, “yer thinkin’ on the matter ain’t a bit muzzy-headed?”

Mal’s hard look across the table said loud and clear: you’re going to want to back down from this.

“All ‘m sayin’ is, ruttin’ with a person don’t always make fer clear thinkin’—”

“You’re goin’ wanna leave this table.”

“’Course, I get the feelin’ that boy ain’t let you anywhere near ‘is nethers since he’s been back . . .”

Mal said nothing.

“Yeah,” Jayne said as he gets up and takes his food with him. “Thought so.”

25.

Mal spent the rest of the night more agitated than usual. He couldn’t do anything right, it seemed, when it came to Wash, and now it looked like that might be about spill over into how he dealt with the rest of the crew.

He wandered across the catwalk in the darkened cargo bay, pausing to lean over on the rail. He was glad they didn’t have any live cargo just now; he wasn’t sure he could handle any more noise than he had in his head already.   

He hated fighting with Wash over his treatment, hated dealing with his repeated insubordination, his moodiness, his not eating, not sleeping. But that wasn’t the worst of it. Jayne had hit a little too close to home at the dinner table that night. If Wash wanted to keep their relationship strictly professional from then on, he could deal with it. It wouldn’t be easy, but he could. He put his feelings aside, kept his wants under control for years when it was Zoë Wash loved, not him.  Besides, after everything he’d seen, in the war and since, he was pretty sure he didn’t believe in ‘happily ever after’s anyway. At least not for people like him.

But Wash ran hot and cold. One minute they’d be on the bridge, talking easily like old times, the next, he’d be giving Mal this distant, disgusted look that was unnerving as hell. One minute he’d be all over Mal, the next minute, he couldn’t seem to handle being touched at all.

It was true what Jayne said; things between them hadn’t been like they were before. Sometimes it felt like they could be. Wash would touch him with that easy familiarity they used to have and he would touch back. It always went the same way: when Mal reciprocated, Wash’s hands got greedier and they ended up pressed together, tongues sliding over one another, feeling each other’s need hard between them.

Then something would happen—Mal could never tell what set it off—Wash’s grip got a little too tight and then he’d be pushing Mal away like he couldn’t get away fast enough.

Asking what was wrong didn’t help; usually Wash took off, leaving him standing there dumbly. Going after him, he’d learned from experience, just led to another shouting match, and most troubling of all, Wash steadfastly refused to come into Mal’s bunk for any reason, even to retrieve the few items he had left behind.

“He won’t go into your bunk, will he?”

Mal heard a familiar voice in the shadows, even though he didn’t remember footsteps approaching.

“When he sleeps at all, it’s the bunk he used to share with Zoë, isn’t it?”

“’S right.”

“It hurts you.”

River came up beside him, wrapping her small, pale hand around the railing.  

“Just important he’s okay, s’all.”

“But he’s not okay, is he?”

“No lil’ albatross, he’s not.”

River didn’t anything to that.

“He needs doctorin’, but not the kind your brother does. I can’t think of a way he can get it won’t land ‘im back in that place we took ‘em out of.”

“He isn’t telling you everything.”

“Believe me, River, he ain’t tellin’ me any—”

“Not Wash.”

“Come again, lil’ albatross?”

“He isn’t telling you everything. He thinks he’s protecting you. Protecting Wash.”

“Who’s that? Your brother I take it? You wanna tell me what your brother ain’t? ‘Cause if I were to be truthsome, I’d tell you I’d give anything t’have my pilot back—“

“Not just your pilot, Captain.”

“Not just my pilot, albatross.” He looks down at hands. “So. Tell me.”

Mal hated the feeling of hope that was stirring in chest. Hope. It disappointed him so many times before. He tried to push it away, but it was too seductive—his mind was already clinging to the idea that there might be something he could do, some way he could fix all this.  

“Can’t tell you. Have to see for yourself. Have to see what he went through, so you know what dragons he has to slay.”

She reached into her pocket and handed him a disc.

26.

As brilliant as River is, Mal thought, sometimes she gets it wrong. Terribly wrong. All the brains in the world doesn’t necessarily give you insight into human nature. He tried not let his anger show—she was just a kid after all. But he knew it’ll be a long time before he forgives her.

He’d waited ‘til Serenity was far enough in its sleep cycle that everyone was in their bunks, or near enough to what passed, anyway. He’d gone up to the bridge, closing the hatch behind him, and fed the disc into the CorVue.

As he’d expected, it was taken from the prison computers when River had hacked into the system to find Wash and override the security: the vid feed from the ‘interrogation’ sessions Wash had been subjected to. He’d say it was more like a snuff film, but even that seems like putting it generously. In a snuff film, mercifully, it ends.

Mal wasn’t even sure why he kept watching. He couldn’t stay seated for it, that’s for sure. He stood, then paced a few feet away, but his eyes never leave the screen.

He saw some pretty awful things during the war, and hell, some of the things he’s seen since the war he knows are going to haunt him to his grave. But nothing ever hit him the way this did. He never felt anything like this—this rage, this utter helplessness.

Mal told himself there must have been something wrong with the protein at dinner when he was bent over the toilet later, emptying his insides. When his alarm went off at 0600, he hadn’t even dozed. He was exhausted and jumpy and every manner strung out. He did his best to go about his day, but truth be told, he was useless to anybody.

And things between him and Wash only got worse.

27\. One Month Later

It’d been a rough week. Another rough week, more like. Hell, it’d been another rough month.

Mal followed the now-familiar sound of a commotion down the hallway. Since watching the vid-feed, he couldn’t seem to bring himself to do much about it when Wash disobeyed orders; and now, predictably, it was taking its toll on the rest of the crew. When he came into the engine room, he realized things have hit a new low: River looked on helplessly as Wash and Jayne shouted at the top of their lungs.

It twisted his gut that Kaylee, his sweet mèi mèi, is in tears. It sent his blood boiling when he realized she was crying because Wash was berating her over something. Piánzhì de jiū chá yuán.

“Wèi le ài de tiān a!”

Everyone went silent. They weren’t used to this from the captain.

“Get out. Alla you ‘cept Wash. Out!”

River, Kaylee, and Jayne hurried out, all avoiding his eyes. It didn’t matter, Mal wasn’t looking at them anyway. He and Wash were staring at each other like two wild animals about to tear each other apart with their teeth.

Mal didn’t even try to stay in control. He was too tired, too angry. He crossed the room in an instant, taking Wash by the shirt, gripping him by the neck and shoving him hard up against the bulkhead.

“No one makes my mechanic cry, not even you, dŏng má?”

Wash broke into a humorless laugh, even as the captain’s grip practically choked him.

“That funny t’you?” Mal was about as close to the breaking point as he’d ever come.

“You said,” Wash choked, “‘even me’.”

Mal pushed Wash against the bulkhead harder, trying to fight the urge to knock his head up against the metal.

“Even your yănsè lāng, you mean,” Wash spat bitterly.

Mal dropped him like his clothes had caught fire. That came out of nowhere. Wash used Mal’s surprise to his full advantage, moving with a quickness Mal hardly thought possible. So Mal was the one pinned up against the bulkhead.

“Let me suck your cock, Mal. Isn’t that what this is really about? You want your yănsè lāng on his knees again?” Wash said it low, breath on Mal’s ear, pressing up against Mal’s body foot to shoulder.  

Mal was a good bit stronger than Wash—he could overpower him well enough—but hearing Wash talk about himself that way had him all manner of reeling. So he just stood there dumbly.

Wash gave him a bitter, knowing look, like he’d just admitted to something terrible that Wash already knew about him, but it was all the worse to hear it out loud.

Wash took a step back and got on his knees.

The way he does it—self-loathing, utterly resigned—filled Mal with revulsion. Suddenly, he was reliving something that never happened to him. He was a guard in that vid-feed and Wash was his prisoner—his prisoner to whom he could do absolutely anything he likes.  

Wash started to fumble with his fly.

Mal hated himself. He hated himself in a way he never had—not when he was powerless to stop the Alliance from stealing his family’s livelihood, not when he was leading teenagers to their deaths during the Unification War, not when he lost Zoë, the closest thing to a sister he ever had.

He hated himself for it, but he couldn’t bring himself to push Wash away.

Wash was all over him, mouthing him through the fabric, running his hands up and down his thighs. Mal wanted desperately to push him away, but he was too exhausted, mentally and physically, to resist.  

When Wash started to undo the metal buttons of his fly, Mal knew he was lost. He was already rock-hard, throbbing with need. Wash looked up at him with glazed eyes and his stomach did about a dozen flips. It’d been so long since he’d had this. Lately, even when he was alone, especially after he and Wash had had one of their false starts and afterwards he was alone , miserable, trying to jack-off, all he could see was that vid-feed and Wash being hurt, used—and he would go soft.

So it said a lot about Mal’s addled mental state and physical deprivation that the same thing doesn’t happen now. But Mal was dying for it, and here was Wash on his knees, ready to give it to him.

Mal ran his fingers through that red-blonde hair, clinging to how real Wash felt in his hands. Wash pushed cloth aside and Mal felt cool air hit his skin, then warm, wet heat as Wash’s mouth closed over him. He leaned back against the cold metal, thinking his knees might buckle. That tongue, lǎo tiān yě, that tongue. He tried to slow down, make it last, but Wash knew exactly what he needed, and even if he hadn’t, Mal had just gone too long without it.

Mal was riding the edge. Gently, gently, he started to thrust—but then, like a bucket of ice water, Wash’s hands were suddenly digging into his hips, pushing into him, pushing him away. Wash scrambled backward, coughing uncontrollably.

“Ye su, Wash—”

Mal recovered from his surprise and bent down, tiān xiăo de, he thought, he knew he didn’t push too far, he barely thrust at all—what the shénshèng de gāowán is going on? Wash was still coughing as Mal put a hand on his shoulder, asking if everything’s okay.

Mal got a punch in the mouth for his trouble. Wash had a good right hook when he needed to.

Not again.

“Wash—”

Wash only responded with a series of colorful Chinese curses, telling Mal to stay the gorramn hell away from him.

Mal realized, through the fog, he has no choice.

He hauled Wash up by the arm.

“My bunk. Now.”

Even witnessing Wash’s absolute submission just then, Mal still half-expected him to refuse. Wash yanked away from his grip angrily, like an angry teenager pulled away from a fight, but he stumbled through the hatch toward Mal’s bunk nonetheless.

If he could have anything, Mal thought, if he could wear a shiny hat and be the king of all Londonium, he would send Wash someplace far away and perfectly safe. But he wasn’t. The kind of life they have on Serenity was the only kind of life left for people like them.

They had got no choice but to keep flying, and if they were going to do that and live, there had to be honesty, order, and a chain of command. If Mal left things as they were, he knew, he risked letting Wash pull the whole crew into his madness.

28.

When they get to Mal’s bunk, Wash hesitated, but he didn’t outright refuse.

“You wanna continue this, it’s gonna hafta t’be down there.”

To his surprise, Wash went down the ladder without argument, though it was obvious it was making him jumpy as hell. Mal didn’t know why Wash had refused to come down here since he got back, but he reckoned he had some notion after all that yănsè lāng business back in the engine room. Mal saw the vid feed, he knew what that búshì dōngxi purplebelly said to his pilot. But Wash couldn’t possibly be so broken that he believed it, could he?

Mal planned on giving a speech—about crew and loyalty, about how being hurt yourself didn’t justify hurting other people. The words didn’t quite come though. He knew he was fair to middlin’ at being a sergeant, then being a captain—at least he used to be—but as far as him and Wash in this bunk went, none of that applied. He hoped Wash realized that that was the reason this was the only place they could have this discussion.

“Thought we were going to pick up where we left off, Mal,” Wash said when the captain didn’t make a move.

Against his better judgment, Mal let himself be kissed. He let Wash’s warm, smooth lips press against his and Wash’s muscular arms loop around his neck. He tipped his head and let Wash push into his mouth, let their tongues slide over one another gently.

Nice and easy. So far so good.

He had to be a glutton for punishment, Mal thought, as many times as they’ve started down this road and it ended badly. But right then, he didn’t know what else to do other than hope that things will be different here, where Wash had to confront the truth about the way things once were.

“Anytime you want this to stop, anytime at all, you jus’ say the word and it does,” Mal said, pulling back and looking into Wash’s eyes so his pilot knew just how serious he was.

“No need to hit me again,” he added as they went back to kissing, still feeling the throb in his jaw.

They started touching a little more too, but Mal let Wash set the pace, making sure it was him to dictate each new step.

The captain didn’t allow it, however, when Wash made a move to get down on his knees again, stopping him with a firm grip on his arms.

“No. Not t’night. Anything else you wanna do, we do, but not that.”

Wash gave him a long, puzzled look that Mal couldn’t quite figure out and before kissing him again. But that time, it was all different.

Wash’s hands were in his hair, gripping painfully hard. Mal didn’t stop him though, even when his kisses started to feel more like bites. Wash’s tongue on his neck made him shiver with pleasure one minute, but the next, there were teeth on his shoulder, unyielding, breaking the skin. But still, he let Wash do as he liked.

Wash went to take his boots off and Mal took that as his cue to do the same. The shirts were next—worn fabric pealing back to reveal flushed skin. They had both waited far too long for this.

Wash seemed determined that they weren’t going to wait much longer. Wash fumbled in the drawer for the lube—it hadn’t been moved since he left—which Mal took to mean he should get on the bed.

“No—over here.”

Wash motioned to the desk and Mal turned around obediently, laying his palms flat on the smooth wood. They’d done this before, but Mal was still a little surprised. He figured their first time back and all, Wash would want to do something—well, he couldn’t say romantic, but he couldn’t think of a better word either.

Wash came up close behind him and his heart beat faster when he heard Wash’s zipper being undone. Mal felt his own trousers being pulled down to his knees. It made his cock throb with want when Wash pressed bare skin up against him.

He startled a bit when Wash pushed him further over the desk, face to the surface of it, and he found himself completely prone and vulnerable.

Wash pushed a couple slicked-up fingers into him roughly and Mal willed himself to relax, but it was just too much, too fast. The fingers got replaced quickly and there was pain at first, and then after a few strokes, pleasure too. Wash gripped Mal’s hips like he was afraid he going to try to get away. Mal knew there were going to be bruises.

This was something completely new. The sex they’ve had in the past could never have been described as rough—frantic, sometimes—but never rough.

Wash slid his cock in and out of him in a steady rhythm and it felt good for awhile, but then Wash started to move in him a bit faster, a bit deeper, and it hurt a little too. Not so bad that he thought of asking Wash to stop, but bad enough that he couldn’t deny it either. He went to touch himself—it didn’t hurt so much that it had banked his arousal overly much—but Wash pushed his hand away.

Mal wasn’t used to this rough treatment from Wash, but it felt so good to be this close again, so good to feel Wash taking pleasure in his body, that those thoughts blocked out everything else. He took slow, steady breaths, willing himself to relax. The low sounds of pleasure Wash was making fueled his desire, telling him that he was doing the right thing.

Before long, Wash cursed and Mal felt his grip tighten, his insides fill with wet heat.

It took a few moments for either one of them to recover. Mal winced when Wash pulled out of him, stepping away and trying to catch his breath.  

Wash saw his face and suddenly looked concerned.

“Lăo tiān bù—I didn’t hurt you—”

Mal shook his head. Nothing he couldn’t handle. Wash needed, he realizes, a kind of exorcism—and if that’s what he needed, that’s what Mal would let him have. He’d do just about anything for this man, he was coming to realize.

“Let me take care of that,” Wash said, looking over Mal’s arousal with one of his sly smiles. Mal nodded gratefully, pulling Wash close and kissing him again, putting the pilot’s hand on his erection.

“Not like that,” Wash said. “Let’s get in bed.”

Mal was happy to oblige. He was tired and sore and as much as he wanted tonight to be about taking care of Wash, his body had needs too.

They took off the rest of their clothes and relished the feel of cool sheets on bare skin before Mal straddled Wash’s body and started trailing small kisses across it. Even covered in scars, Wash had a beautiful, muscular chest that never failed to make Mal a bit weak. He took a nipple in his mouth, rolling his tongue over it then teasing it lightly with his teeth.

“I want you in me, Mal.”

Mal just nodded and went back to what he was doing. Just hearing Wash say those words made his cock jump and his balls tighten, but he wanted to take his time.

“Now, Mal. Fuck me.” Wash’s voice was lower this time. Demanding and tinged with lust.

Mal looked up, searching those blue eyes.

“Want you to come in me, wanna be yours again.”

Suddenly it made sense.

He understood what Wash wanted, but he couldn’t say he wanted that kind of responsibility. Mal hated the idea of sex as claiming—fit too well with the way of thinking those Triumph settlers had—but it is and isn’t, so Mal pushed his doubts aside and concentrated on doing exactly what Wash wanted him to.

Since Wash wouldn’t let him wait any longer, he got right to it, slicking himself up and starting to gently prepare Wash’s body. He went as slow and easy as he possibly could, even when he judged that Wash was ready for him. He pressed his cock into Wash’s hot, waiting body, going a little bit at a time, ignoring the heels digging into his back, demanding he go faster. He made sure Wash stills felt good, still felt comfortable. He wanted this to be so completely unlike what Wash’s captors had done to him that he wouldn’t ever be tempted to confuse the two.

Finally, when Mal was fully seated in him, Wash’s legs hooked over his shoulders, he leaned in so their faces are close. He kissed that pretty neck and looked into those blue eyes and he knew for sure he hadn’t felt this good in a long, long time.

Wash was aroused again in no time and Mal reached down to slide his hand over him in gentle strokes in time with his own. Wash moaned, pushing back into him eagerly and it was all Mal could do to last too much longer.

Mine, Mal said as he came, holding Wash tight against him, and he meant it.

Wash came a little bit after, Mal’s name on his lips, and Mal thought he might never have heard anything that sounded so good in his life.

They went about taking care of the necessities in silence, but it was a more comfortable silence than they’d had between them in a long time. By the time Mal crawled into bed, Wash was already perfectly motionless. Mal scooted in as gently as he could, trying not to wake him, but Wash rolled over, mumbling something incoherent, and curled his body up against the captain’s. Barely a couple of minutes went by before Mal could tell Wash was completely asleep again. He wasn’t surprised; his pilot had been all manner of sleep deprived for months now, and the evening had been pretty intense for both of them.  

Mal, however, didn’t sleep for a long time. He closed his eyes but stayed awake, listening to the sound of Wash breathing and enjoying the feel of warm skin on skin.

He knew better than to think that one night of good sex was going to fix things. But tonight also felt like the first thing he’d done in a long while that wasn’t a step in the wrong direction either. Wash was telling him what he needed now at least, and he seemed to be sleeping easy in his arms. That counted for something.

  
29\. Epilogue

Wash took it to heart when Mal told him he could talk to him about it anytime, that he was always there to listen or for whatever else he needs. He knew saying something like that came about as natural to Mal as breathing under water, so it meant a lot to him that he said it—and meant for that matter. Wash knew Jayne meant basically the same thing when he told Wash that he could borrow one of his knives sometime and they “‘could have a pretty good time throwin’ em at some shit.”

Wash didn’t take either one of them up on their offer though. He and Mal had other ways of expressing themselves to each other, ways that didn’t have so much to do with talking. He talked to River about it sometimes, and she told him about the Academy.

Simon gave him print outs of things he found on the cortex, things where the titles were always in pastels and swoopy fonts and began with the word Coping. He knew that sort of thing was a help to a lot of people, and he took them in the spirit they were intended, but they’re not really for him. Everyone has their own way of working through something like this, and ultimately, even with the help of a family as loyal as the crew of Serenity—everyone has to do it on their own.  

Simon gave them all a pill they could keep with them on a chain around their necks, should they ever be a position where they thought that was the best option. At first, it reminded Wash of the war in a way that he really didn’t want to be reminded—all the pilots had them, in case they were shot down—but he knew it was the smart thing to do. In some ways, it was even a comfort. There wasn’t going to be any clean resolution for them—the forces within the Parliament that wanted River back, that wanted to take revenge on Malcolm Reynolds—they weren’t going to go away anytime soon.

All they could do now was push out into the black a little farther, stealing as many moments of happiness along the way as they could. Happiness—and of course, contraband.

“What I don’t get,” Wash said to River as they sat on the bridge one night, looking out over the stars, “is how you knew about the nursery rhyme. The one you were humming when they attacked the ship. How’d you know that sadistic bùyàoliǎn sonnuvabitch used to hum that? He wasn’t with the soldiers that came on board, so how’d you get a read off of him?”

“I didn’t read it off of him, I read it off of you.”

“Huh. Well, I guess that says something, doesn’t it?”

“Experience like that stays with you. Doesn’t mean it controls you. Doesn’t mean you don’t have choices.”

“River Tam,” Wash said good-naturedly, “are you trying to psychologize me?”

River looked away a bit guiltily. “The dinosaurs told me to. They worry about you—even though you seem a lot better most days. They’re sorry you had to go through that, and that afterwards, you couldn’t have a better kind of help. That it was only a pieced together, jury-rigged kind of help, like Kaylee’s got to do for the ship when Captain can’t get her the parts she needs.”

“That so?” Wash asked, amused. Amused, and more than a little touched. “Well, you know they told me the same thing about you.”

River smiled all the way up to her eyes.

“Besides,” Wash continued, “Kaylee’s ship runs pretty damn good, doesn’t it?

“Tiān xiăo de! Better than good. Never lets us down—always takes us where we need to go.”


End file.
